The Process of Being Cast and Shooting The Blacklist

Hola! I recently wrote a post about how I finally landed a TV gig! I was lucky enough to just land another one and I thought I'd share with you guys about what the process is like! Here I am on set between takes on my first day!

Back to the beginning!

I'm lucky enough to have an agent and a manager here in NYC. They submit me to projects. If casting thinks I'm right for a role and are interested in seeing me I get an email like this from my agents/casting office. It has all the basic info I need to know about the role, what show it is, where I'm to go, the script ect. Things in TV move very, very quickly. I got this email on January 11th and, as you can see, the audition was for the following morning. So, that evening, I memorized my scenes and ate cereal for dinner because I'm a damn adult. It's very important that you are completely memorized when you go into a film/TV audition. The casting directors want exactly what you'll give on the day of filming so you have to go in knowing all the lines cold. I used to be really bad at memorizing but have gotten much better!

On the 12th I went to my audition and promptly tried to forget about it. It's a self preservation thing. With the amount of rejection one gets as an actor, it's best to pretend that once you're done with an audition, it never happened (unless you hear back). Normally, if you don't hear back from casting the same day, (when working in TV) you aren't going to hear back. I was lucky and got an email late in the evening that I was to go to a callback the next day to meet with the directors of the show. I ate dim sum to try and calm my nerves -- soup dumplings are life.

It was the long weekend so I was trying to pretend I wasn't thinking about my callback all weekend. I tend to overthink things so I tried to stay busy. Monday evening, I got this lovely email saying that I had booked the role! I promptly got pizza in celebration!!

Once you land a role, things tend to move even faster. I was in a costume fitting the next day as my role filmed on the 19th not the 20th as the production office had originally stated.

These are pictures the costume designer sends to production. They end up deciding what I wear. This is the first look that I ended up wearing. I'm quite horrible dressing myself in life. I enjoy sweat pants, top knot buns and no make up. So, going to costume fittings is always fun. They always choose the cutest outfits.

This is the second look I ended up wearing. I was supposed to be in Florida in the show, so I got to freeze on set!

Just a few other options that I didn't end up wearing.

Ahhhhh early ass call times. The joys of working in tv! This is a picture taken at 6:15am waiting to go into the Holland Tunnel to get my ass into the city. And, look, already lots of traffic. However, the real MVP's are all the fabulous, hard working people working behind the camera. They get to set at least an hour earlier than everyone else. They're amazing.

First thing is first. Make myself look like I'm alive. The first thing they do when you get to set is give you a coffee the size of your brain, water and stick you in the make-up or hair chair. The whole process usually takes around an hour! I got my hair done first and then was rushed to a rehearsal with the actors. Rehearsal is just going over lines, blocking (where the actors walk so camera knows how to follow) and talking to the director. Again, this is all really fast paced. Since episodes are constantly shooting everyone is always rushing. I'm still pretty new to all this so I have to concentrate hard to make sure I don't make a fool of myself! My scene for this day was with Meghan Boone (Elizabeth Keen) and Diego Klattenhoff (Donald Ressler). I had to stop fangirling all over him because I loved him in Pacific Rim! After rehearsal I got my makeup done.

While I wait to go shoot I hang out in my dressing room. The number on your dressing room denotes the number you are on the call sheet. It helps everyone on set keep track of all the actors and where they're supposed to be at what times/days. It ended up being a really, really quick turn around as I was the first scene shot of the day. Right after I got into my costume the nice sound guy came and put my mic pack on me and I was rushed to set. We filmed for around 2 hours to get the coverage we needed. I was being interrogated (in the scene) so the camera set ups were really nice and simple. Like I've mentioned, since TV works so fast they use more than one camera to film, and film you from multiple angles. This day I had two. Really intimidating.

Here I am on my second day of filming with my TV boyfriend. I played the other woman..dun dun DUN! He is really cool and super a nice guy. Daniel Eric Gold - wonderful actor!

When I was done I came back to my dressing room and got some craft service and filled all of my paperwork out. Who doesn't love some french toast?! They were also making these amazing fresh pressed juices so I grabbed one of those, too!

Here's a screen shot of the final product. I was in episode 4.15 - The Apothecary. Overall, I'm happy with how it turned out. Here's hoping I get more opportunities, soon!

I always love hearing from you guys!! If you have any questions, feel free to ask away. I love making new friends or find me on Instagram @ajmorale :)